Religions are not equals

[Thumpalumpacus]

but if those 'pockets of sanity' are actually apostates of their own professed religion  . . .

See the problem ?

Indeed. Even as BB posits an NTS fallacy, he seems to be practicing it.

[Crunchy]

[Thumpalumpacus]

As soon as they turned their ire towards islam though... bigots and racists and islamophobes. 

Some have called them that, but I don't think that represents a majority opinion of any of them. The fact is that bigotry against Muslims has been the case here in America longer than you or I have been alive.

Now, if those same authors came out and said "Blacks are a serious problem" based on, say, the minority represented by prison numbers, would you wonder if they had a bigoted agenda? I would.

I don't believe any of those guys have a bigoted agenda, but I know damned well that many folks use the argumentation of Harris et al to buttress their preexisting bigotry.

[WinterHold]

[Crunchy]

As soon as they turned their ire towards islam though... bigots and racists and islamophobes. 

Some have called them that, but I don't think that represents a majority opinion of any of them. The fact is that bigotry against Muslims has been the case here in America longer than you or I have been alive.

Now, if those same authors came out and said "Blacks are a serious problem" based on, say, the minority represented by prison numbers, would you wonder if they had a bigoted agenda? I would.

I don't believe any of those guys have a bigoted agenda, but I know damned well that many folks use the argumentation of Harris et al to buttress their preexisting bigotry

Since I already agreed with you previously I'm glad to see you agree with the entire thrust of this thread. 
Religions are not equals, religions are not people, and it's a mistake to label critics of Islam as racists or bigots just because of that criticism.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Some have called them that, but I don't think that represents a majority opinion of any of them. The fact is that bigotry against Muslims has been the case here in America longer than you or I have been alive.

Now, if those same authors came out and said "Blacks are a serious problem" based on, say, the minority represented by prison numbers, would you wonder if they had a bigoted agenda? I would.

I don't believe any of those guys have a bigoted agenda, but I know damned well that many folks use the argumentation of Harris et al to buttress their preexisting bigotry

Since I already agreed with you previously I'm glad to see you agree with the entire thrust of this thread. 
Religions are not equals, religions are not people, and it's a mistake to label critics of Islam as racists or bigots just because of that criticism.

I don't agree with the entire thrust. Religions aren't people, but they are interpreted by people, and as such, too many folks -- on both sides of the argument --conflate the two, wrongly, in my opinion. Some Muslims cotton to the extremist views, others are cafeteria Muslims, but get defensive when they're broad-brushed.

I can certainly understand that reaction, being an atheist. Lord knows we've been broad-brushed enough that we ought to be cautious we don't do the same thing ourselves.

[brewer]

OP: The same can be said of cults. Or The Elks. Or Country Clubs. Or the mob.

I'm anti homeopath, anti naturopath and anti chiropractor. I really don't care what other people say that makes me. 

Now excuse me, time to flip the Zoroastrian baby on the grill.

[Ravenshire]

How many Mormons does it take to change a light bulb? Two...one to make the replacement and another to say it wasn't changed.

How many christians does it take to change a light bulb?

Just the pastor, but it takes the whole congregation to spread the word about the resurrected light.

[Crunchy]

Thumpalumpacus Wrote:
I don't agree with the entire thrust. Religions aren't people, but they are interpreted by people, and as such, too many folks -- on both sides of the argument --conflate the two, wrongly, in my opinion. Some Muslims cotton to the extremist views, others are cafeteria Muslims, but get defensive when they're broad-brushed. 

I can certainly understand that reaction, being an atheist. Lord knows we've been broad-brushed enough that we ought to be cautious we don't do the same thing ourselves.

You say you don't agree but I can't see any disagreement from what you've written.
You agree that religions aren't people and also agree that people do conflate the two on both sides. Once again, I agree with you but I don't see how that is any invalidation of the thrust of this thread. I think you're bringing up a related yet separate issue (that we also agree on)

I'm thinking that because I only was only discussing the "liberal" mistakes in calling critics of islam racists that you may have assumed I don't see the "conservative" mistake in lumping all muslims together into one monolithic group. I actually don't do that as I believe both liberals who excuse islam by labelling critics as racists and conservatives who see Muslim people as islam itself are both failing at separating the religion from the adherents.  I didn't make that clear.  However, that was because the thread was about the labelling of critics as "racist" and "bigots". 
We can certainly discuss the issue of seeing people as a monolithic representation of a text book and it is certainly part of the problem that arises when we conflate people and religion but it seems we already agree on that as well.

Just one nitpick: 
You said that people interpret religion. I bring this up because I've heard this before in the context that it is racist to see one religion as worse than another because it's people who interpret religion and you are therefore seeing one person as worse than another if you see one religion as worse than another. (which I know is not how you meant it)
It's true but irrelevant as people interpret literally everything. Everything that is interpreted is interpreted by people. Quantum Mechanics is interpreted by people and yet no one conflates Quantum Mechanics with people. As far as I can see it's only religion that gets this special treatment.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I'm sorry if it seemed like I was lumping you in with the groupthinkers. That wasn't my intention at all.